High-level al-Qaida leader is captured

BAGHDAD, Iraq | The man who supervised the bombers of a revered Shiite shrine in Samarra last February, an act that set off a wave of brutal sectarian violence, has been captured.

Iraq’s national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, said the second-ranking leader of al-Qaida in Mesopotamia, Hamid Juma Faris Jouri al-Saeedi, was captured several days ago near Baquba.

Rubaie described Saeedi as al-Qaida’s deputy commander in Iraq, serving beneath Abu Ayyub al-Masri, who took over the organization after Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s death.

But a United States military official was more cautious in describing Saeedi’s place in the organization’s pecking order. Although he was a “top-tier guy” who supervised those who carried out the Samarra bombing, “I’m not sure we are ready to put a number on him,” said the American official, who agreed to speak only without being identified. “It’s a very decentralized operation,” the official said.